Toys and Gender

Toys and Gender The way children are raised in today’s society is based on the age old tradition of gender appropriate toys for sons and daughters. The idea that girls will always play with feminine toys, and boys will always play with masculine toys has been passed down from generation to generation dating back to the age of men. In medieval times, sons would learn to practice swordplay and knighthood, while daughters would learn sewing and practice at being a princess. The theory of Gender Role identification is important to everyone because it impacts every child and its parents all over the world. The media is also heavily influential to this idea as well in the way it portrays children in the society. Thus, understanding how children play and what that means in regards to gender role is essential to understanding a child’s growth. Gender roles as defined in the book Choices in Relationships are the social norms that dictate what is socially regarded as appropriate female and male behavior. As children grow up, they essentially learn these specific traits and behaviors from their parents and other children they are around. In the bigger scale of things, children also learn these behaviors from television, radio, movies, magazines and almost every other media outlet that exists. The media plays an important role in this topic because it showcases how they believe the gender roles should be. The book describes this issue by saying, “Media images of women and men typically conform to traditional gender stereotypes, and media portrayals depicting the exploitation, victimization, and sexual objectification of woman are common.”(pg.90) In a sense, the way children identify with their gender roles is directly influenced by the mass media and the way gender stereotypes are portrayed is going to be an ongoing issue in child gender development. The way a child plays when growing up is directly related to the social learning process. “A derivative of behavioral

Cited: Knox, David, and Caroline Schacht. Choices in Relationships: an Introduction to Marriage and Family. 10th ed. Australia: Wadsworth, 2010. Print.